Bob Chapek, fired as Disney CEO in 2022 after less than three years, lays the blame for his ouster squarely on Bob Iger in a upcoming memoir, according to the New York Times, which obtained a copy.

Behind the Castle Walls: My Thirty Years at the Happiest Place on Earth comes out Sept. 29 from Gallery Books, a division of Simon & Schuster.

“My abrupt dismissal hurt my reputation, leaving those close to me, outsiders and some within the kingdom trying to figure out what I did wrong,” Chapek writes. “The answer, again, is nothing.” Instead, he claims that Iger, who had handpicked him for the job, relentlessly and intentionally sabotaged him.

Chapek’s belief on that front is no secret but he lays out his thoughts and defends his tenure publicly at length for the first time in the book. He calls himself a disrupter and writes, “I didn’t get a chance to finish what I started.”

Iger resigned abruptly as Disney CEO in February of 2020 after an epic run but remained as executive chairman for two years, retaining control over creative endeavors at the company and reporting directly to the board of directors. Chapek reported to both the board, and to Iger. The two clashed. Chapek suggests that Iger believed he could reclaim the job whenever he wanted, the NYT says.

Describing Iger’s exit from Disney, Chapek wrote, “I have been told by several high-ranking people both in government and private business that in their opinions, the real reason he left the company so abruptly was his anticipation of the arrival of Covid.”

Disney declined to comment.

The company has denied the pandemic had anything to do with Iger’s exit. Iger has said he wanted to wind down after a successful run. He felt at the time that Chapek was the right person for the job.

“I had been CEO for about 15 years. I started the company in 1974m at ABC. I had been around a long time. There were plenty of things in the world that I was interested in that I either wanted to do or wanted to learn more about. I had not really had a day off in I don’t even remember,” Iger told a NYT DealBook conference in 2023 about his departure. He said he was “disappointed in what I was seeing, both during the transition period when I was still there and while I was out. But I really worked hard at distancing myself from it because one, I couldn’t do anything about. It in a way, it wasn’t my business at all, really. It was his business to run.”

Soon after he started as CEO, Chapek was being pilloried on several fronts including management decisions that vexed key executives, and a public fight with star Scarlett Johansson that alienated talent. The company’s response to legislation (dubbed the ‘Don’t Say Gay’ bill) in Florida angered both Disney employees and Gov. Ron DeSantis. His ouster came shortly after Disney reported a greater than expected $1.5 billion streaming loss for its latest quarter.

Chapek’s apparent rubber stamp by the Disney board, followed by his rocky tenure, was used as ammunition by activist investor Nelson Peltz in a bruising proxy fight with the Mouse House.

Iger returned as chief executive after Chapek was fired and remained in the job through March of this year. Josh D’Amaro, head of Disney’s giant theme parks and experiences business, was named CEO after a considerably more robust executive search process.

Chapek, a 30-year Disney veteran, had also been running parks and experiences when he was anointed chief. He had worked with D’Amaro and says he was instrumental in the current CEO’s ascent. “I consistently suggested the idea of promoting him,” Chapek wrote. “He had been a relative unknown in the corporate hierarchy before I singled him out.”

Peter Byrne, the singer and songwriter for the band Naked Eyes who scored 1980s hits with “Always Something There to Remind Me” and “Promises, Promises,” died peacefully in Los Angeles, California, on Monday, September 14, after a brief illness. He was 74.

His death was announced on the band’s official website.

One of the most popular, if fleeting, British New Wave bands of MTV’s golden era, Naked Eyes was founded in 1982 by Byrne and keyboardist Rob Fisher, who had been college friends in their native Bath, England, and had performed together in a band called Neon from 1979 to 1982. (That band also included Curt Smith and Roland Orzabal, who would go on to form Tears for Fears.)

Within two years Naked Eyes had scored four Top 40 hits on Billboard’s Hot 100. The highest charting was “Always Something There to Remind Me” which peaked at #8 during the summer of 1983. A cover of the 1963 song written by Burt Bacharach and Hal David for Dionne Warwick, the Byrne-Fisher demo of “Always Something There to Remind Me” was strong enough to convince EMI Records to sign the duo that would become Naked Eyes.

The band had three subsequent top 40 hits, the most successful of which was “Promises, Promises,” written by Byrne and Fisher and not to be confused with the Bacharach-David song of the same title that was a hit for Warwick. Both songs were included on the band’s debut 1983 album Burning Bridges, as was a third, less successful single “When the Lights Go Out.”

The band’s second album, 1984’s Fuel For The Fire, featured a modest hit “(What) In the Name of Love,” but failed to match the success of the debut album, prompting Naked Eyes to disband (the group never toured). Fisher died in 1999 at the age of 42 following cancer surgery.

Born June 9, 1952, in Bath, Byrne continued writing, recording and touring following Fisher’s death, releasing the solo album The Real Illusion in 2001 under Pete Byrne, followed by two albums under the Naked Eyes name: Fumbling with the Covers in 2007 and Disguise the Limit in 2021. A remaster of the original Naked Eyes self-titled album was release in 2025.

In 2008 Byrne’s Naked Eyes too, part in the U.S. “Regeneration” tour with Belinda Carlisle, ABC and the Human League, and in 2024 joined a similarly ’80s themed tour of the U.S. and Canada with Wang Chung, Men Without Hats and The Motels.

Outside of Naked Eyes, Byrne’s work included providing backing vocals on Stevie Wonder’s 1985 hit “Part-Time Lover,” as well as songwriting for film and television. He wrote the song “I Am The Cute One” in 1993 for the Olsen Twins.

Byrne is survived by his siblings Eileen, Sandy, Carol and Steve; children Merlin, Dylan, and Chloe; and ex-wife Elena. A private service will be held for the family.

Listen to “Promises, Promises” and “Always Something There To Remind Me” below: